Posts Tagged railroad

I have been contacted by a couple of people that have found milk bottles buried in their backyard however I was recently contacted by Jackie Eidenmiller who found much more. She mentioned that her husband and her stated using a metal detector in the area around their home between Ellwood Road and the Wurtemburg cutoff (part of the old Gardner farm).

Jackie shared that they are finding old railroad tracks and wheels from carts or small trains. They are also finding tools like sledge hammer heads, wedges and picks. There is a lot of cut limestone in the area, and there are remnants of a railroad bed there also.

It is believed that the defunct Elmwood Brick and Limestone Company formerly operated in the area in the late 1800′s. Some of the artifacts are dated from 1878. Interestingly they are also finding watch parts and harmonica parts everywhere. If you can shed any information it would be helpful. Please share below or email me at info@ellwoodcitymemories.com

Do you remember the big house beside the gas station on the corner of Spring Avenue and Fifth Street? The house located at 426 Spring Avenue was originally built in 1892 by Lenora Roessing who rented out rooms in her home making it one of the earliest boarding houses in Ellwood City. Since Mrs. Roessing sold the house in the early part of 1913, the various owners have added to the original eight room house and even lifted it approximately six feet.  The house increased in size so much that by 1966 four families lived there. That same year, Helen Young who married John Carpenter sold the house and neighboring gas station to Harry & Betty Gaydosz. The gas station was built 1929 and would become known as Harry’s Texaco. Both the house and gas station were torn down when Eckerd Drug Store purchased the land to build their large structure that has since become Rite-Aid.
Also in the picture, you can see the former Tomons Funeral Home and a delivery truck from Linarelli’s Furniture & Appliance Village Center formally of Koppel. Linarelli’s was originally opened by Ralph & Elsie Linarelli as a grocery store on 18 before moving closer to the railroad tracks and becoming a hardware store. Over time they started carrying more furniture and appliances and eventually phased out the hardware and Levi jeans.
If you would like to share a story you might have, please leave a comment below or email me at info@ellwoodcitymemories.com

Photograph courtesy of Zeke’s Auto Repair

Originally Published May 15, 2009

I had a friend email me this picture that looks like a Bud Dimeo photograph for the Ellwood City Ledger but I am not sure where it came from nor who it belongs to. It is not my intention to “steal” anything so please let me know and I will take it down right away – but it is a great photograph.
  What looks like a picture of a parking lot to some is something so much more to me. Of course you see the brick P & LE Freight Station that is still standing today and to the left of it across the railroad tracks is the Baltimore & Ohio Freight Station along Sixth Street that was demolished in 1982. In 1966, the P & LE freight station was converted into a warehouse and offices by Fotia Brothers Sales & Service owners, Sam & Joseph Fotia. Today it is being remodeled again for unknown purposes.
Between the two buildings you can see the tops of two churches in the background. On the left is the former Saint Agatha Roman Catholic Church that served Ellwood City until September of 2007 when it consolidated with its own mission church the Blessed Virgin Mary Church and was renamed Holy Redeemer Church. The second church is the Presbyterian Church which is older than our town itself, having originally organized in the “old brick school house” back on July 14, 1891. The Presbyterian Church continues to serve Ellwood City today despite a fire in 1950.
Speaking of fire, on the far right you can barely make out the old livery on Fourth Street. Architect Byron McCandless who designed portions of Lincoln High School, the Ellwood City Municipal Building, and many others used this building and the brick buildings behind it as his offices. His son Joseph continued to use these buildings for storage until an arson fire destroyed the buildings a number of years ago. His father’s original drawings were lost as was Joseph’s picture taken of the Marines on D-day only a few yards from the beach at Normandy. Byron’s father was Joseph McCandless who built the very first brick house in Ellwood City that just recently burned down.
There are many interesting things you can make out in the background of a picture of “a parking lot”. If you would like to share your memories of any of these, please share below or email me at info@ellwoodcitymemories.com

There have been a number of people that have shared their memories of the railroad crossing guard shack on Fourth Street and have asked me numerous times if I had a picture of it. Unfortunately I did not so I want to thank Mr. Zikeli for going to West Pittsburgh and taking the picture above of the old shack in its new location by the restored train station in West Pittsburgh.

For those that don’t know there was a man stationed in this little building next to the railroad tracks full time and when a train would come, he would hurry out swinging a red lantern and put the gate down to block traffic from crossing.  At least that is what I have been told.

I remember the green little building but I do not remember anyone working inside and have to rely on your memories for this information. As a matter of fact I did not even know there was another building for the same purpose on Sixth Street. I am a little embarrassed by this as I later found out that my great grandfather worked at the Sixth Street crossing guard for a number of years after getting hurt working his other job on the railroad.

I know I am not the only one who would enjoy hearing your memories so please share them below or email me at info@ellwoodcitymemories.com

I have been searching for a picture of the “shack” at the railroad crossing at Sixth Street. I guess I should have been clearer on my request. I am looking for a picture of the crossing guard’s shack along the tracks where the crossing guard was stationed.

    However, I am grateful for the picture I did get of the Seidel Coal on Sixth Street behind the gas station on the corner of Sixth Street and Spring Avenue. Considered the original Lowes of the area, Seidel had all the building supplies you needed for new construction. I was told that this is how the building looked the last couple of years it was in business so it is difficult to tell if this picture was taken while the business was still operating or twenty five years after they closed the door. I guess the old saying holds true here – the window washer’s house has the dirtiest windows.

Does anyone remember if this old converted barn structure was torn down or if a fire was the cause of its disappearance?

I decided to repost one of my favorite articles on the web site. The post features a priceless snapshot in time of Ellwood City taken from 196 feet above the town sometime between 1909 and 1915. It is amazing how much has changed from then to today. There is so much in the picture it is easy to miss some of the more interesting things. I have added yellow numbers to some of the points I would like to draw your attention to in this picture, of course there is more than the twelve things I mention here and would love to hear about something I missed.
    The first point of interest I see when I look at this picture is the grand Hotel Lawrence surrounded by the majestic Oliver Park. Though it is difficult to get your bearings with this picture, we are actually looking at the side of the Hotel. The front of the Hotel formally called Hotel Oliver is the side with the large white peaks and faces down Fifth Street.
Secondly, in almost the center of the page we see the Central School building built in 1902 on the corner of Lawrence Avenue and Sixth Street. Today the Ellwood City Municipal Building is located on that lot of land with a number of memorials displayed in the front lawn. The large World War II memorial in front of the Municipal building was purchased through multiple fundraisers including donations and with the extra money that was raised for Ellwood City’s anniversary.
Number three in the picture is the Park Hotel, built 1895 and located on the North side of the Ellwood City Short Line. Today, most people don’t remember the Park Hotel and I have had a difficult time uncovering the fate of the old Hotel. Did it catch on fire from the sparks of a passing train, or was it simply torn down due to dilapidation? The fact remains that the building is no longer there but if you look the next time you drive past, one of the walls from its foundation is still standing today.
Four and Five go together, almost. Point number four is the old train station that is no longer there today and number five points to something that is actually missing from the picture, the Fifth Street Subway. The railroad you see in the picture beside the train station was the Pennsylvania Railroad, who owned Rock Point Park. The railroad through Ellwood City was known more as the Ellwood Short Line and replaced the B&O railroad that was built along the Northern bank of the Connoquenessing Creek in 1876. After the Ellwood Tunnel was completed in 1892 the railroad connecting North Sewickley & Rock Point ran through the natural plain which Ellwood City was built upon and the hilly B&O railroad was abandoned.
Ellwood City owes its birth more to the Ellwood City railroad tunnel and Beaver Falls then the more common misconception of New Castle. Ellwood’s founder H.W. Hartman was dissatisfied with the conditions in Beaver Falls where he was the head of the Beaver Falls Water Company and Hartman Steel Company.  He heard the railroad was planning to build the tunnel to bypass the slower line through Hazel Dell and put his plan for an industrial resort town into action.
The passenger station in the picture, known as the Union Station, served Ellwood City until the mid 1950’s. One text says the station was torn down as late as 1957, while another says it was torn down as early as 1955. Today, a parking lot is all that remains beside what is now the Buffalo & Pittsburgh Rail line.
Just west of the Union Station is number Six, the freight yards of Ellwood City. The large structure on the Northern side of the tracks is the B.O. Freight Station. The station was located just West of Sixth Street which was a main road at the time of the picture as the bridge connecting Ellwood City to Hazel Dell was the Sixth Street Bridge, not the Fifth as it is today. The “Hazel Dell Bridge” as it was known then connected Sixth Street and College Street. The original Fifth Street Bridge was not erected until 1915.
The B.O. Freight Station was demolished in 1982 and the property was sold to the Ellwood City Forge Group.
Our number seven point of interest is one of the few things in the picture still standing today. Point seven is the Stiefel Building on the corner of Lawrence Avenue and Fifth Street. I have yet to discover if the building was named after one of Ellwood City’s most prominent citizens, Mr. R.C. Stiefel, if he actually had the building built, or maybe he even had his offices there.
Number eight is the old tube mill more commonly known to the folks of Ellwood as “Mill B”. Originally the mill was the home of the Ellwood Shafting & Tubing Company, the first manufacturing institution to establish itself in Ellwood City as early as 1891. “Mill B” was dismantled in 1923 and the property was sold to Pittsburgh and Lake Erie Railroad for a freight station and yard. It is hard to see it today but from Sixth Street to Blanks Concrete and Supply was nothing but P&LE spurs. Five or six lines of empty railroad lines loading and unloading freight coming into and out of Ellwood City all day long. August 25th 1981 marked the last day P&LE took a loaded boxcar, cargo from Airway Industries out of Ellwood City.
Nine is less of a specific point as it is a general area. As you can see from the picture, the West End of town was the direction of the growth in the early days of the town. The mills and businesses were more congregated at that end and most Ellwoodians thought that the town would continue to grow in that direction. In fact the first school built in Ellwood City after its founding was the West End School and the first hospitals were all located in that direction of town. It wasn’t until Ralph C. Stiefel and J.H. Nicholson left the Shelby Seamless Tube Company in 1899 and erected the Standard Seamless Tube Company (later called “Mill A”) that the town began spreading east also.
Ten is the beautiful picnic grounds of Oliver Park and the site of Ellwood City’s first murder. According to “A History of Ellwood City, Pennsylvania” James Bell was found in the park next to a tree, murdered. The victim, who had carried the mail from Ellwood City to the Belton Post Office, was also robbed as his pockets were all turned inside out. The park was a popular picnic destination (if you got permission from the Hotel) and how Park Avenue got its name.
Eleven simply points out the large farms and spread out residences that still existed in Hazel Dell. Hazel Dell originally was on both sides of the Connoquenessing until Merrit Green and Henry Hartman purchased all the farms on the South side of the creek to build Ellwood City. The roads through Hazel Dell were the old Indian trading paths from when the Shawnee & Delaware Indian tribes occupied the area. It was these tribes that actually named the Connoquenessing, which means “can’t canoe”. Hazel Dell was cut in half by the Connoquenessing and connected by the covered bridge known as the Jones Mill Bridge or White Bridge (built 1858 and razed 1898) located at the present site of the Fifth Street Bridge.
Hazel Dell did not become a borough until 1901, almost ten years after Ellwood City. The borough of Hazel Dell officially consolidated with the borough of Ellwood City in 1914.
Finally, point number twelve reminds you of the time period that the picture was taken. The buildings with no windows behind the houses are not garages, but barns. Henry Ford introduced the Model T in 1908 but didn’t begin the moving assembly lines in his factory until 1913, so there were not very many cars in the town when this picture was taken. Some of the buildings are barns, other smaller buildings are outhouses. My grandmother’s house inside Pittsburgh Circle was originally built as a boarding house for tube mill workers before indoor plumbing was the big craze on HGTV. Four bedrooms, BIG bedrooms, and no bathroom.

If you noticed something I missed or if you feel that I got something wrong, please leave a comment below or email me at info@ellwoodcitymemories.com

Originally Posted February 5, 2010

I recently had a History’s Mystery about a photograph of the “West Ellwood Junction” and its location. A couple of Memories followers knew exactly where the old station was and helped us out.

Mr. Mark Barnes pointed out that Ellwood Junction was located on the Ellwood side of the Beaver River and West Ellwood Junction was on the Koppel side of the river. Looking at the photograph above, he estimated that the picture is taken from the Koppel side of the river standing just south of the Koppel Bridge looking north. The closest bridge in the picture is the Koppel Bridge and the further one is the old now-abandoned P&LE railroad bridge.

Shane Ferrante confirmed that the two bridges in the picture are still standing. In the foreground is the Koppel Bridge (previously the Pittsburgh, Harmony, Butler and New Castle Railway Bridge), in the background is the bridge for the Ellwood City Branch of the P.& L.E. railroad that snakes its way through Park Gate. If you are coming from Koppel to Ellwood City on Route 351 and you look to the right just as you come upon the Koppel Bridge, you will see where this station once was.

Thank you to all that helped us get the answer to the location of the West Ellwood Junction.

    Mrs. Kay Garwig owned a boarding house in Frisco that had to be torn down when the railroad tunnel was dug out beginning in 1890. The single mother moved into the budding town in 1891 and purchased one of the original Hazel Dell land owner’s houses, the Petit house. Mrs. Garwig turned the house into a boarding house for the railroad workers, passengers on the P & W Railroad, & everyone else who came along.

The Nathaniel Petit & John B. Hazen houses were the only houses north of the new tracks but south of the creek. Beginning in 1891 a number of houses started to be built along Fifth Street north of the tracks. There is a little bit of a mystery as to the original location of the house as it had to be moved. One book mentions that the Petit homestead formerly stood near the “future” site of the Hamilton Brothers on Fifth Street. Another article hints that the house had to be moved because it was located on land designated for the railroad.

After Meritt Green, on behalf of the Pittsburg Company, purchased the family farm, Mr. Green and his family moved into the Petit house. The house was moved less than one hundred yards between Fifth Street and Sixth Street facing Spring Avenue. It was eventually torn down and the site is now occupied by the Alpha Apartments. Until recently there stood an old dilapidated one story wooden house behind the apartments that looked like it hadn’t been lived in for the last hundred years. Mrs. Garwig had given her daughter the land behind the boarding house at her wedding in 1894 and later lived in the new house in the rear of the apartments.

    As I have already mentioned, Ellwood City owes its birth to the Ellwood City railroad tunnel, Beaver Falls, the vision and dedication of Ellwood’s founder H.W. Hartman, and hard work of men like Merritt Green. Hartman was dissatisfied with the conditions in Beaver Falls where he was the head of the Beaver Falls Water Company and Hartman Steel Company when he heard the railroad was planning to carve out the tunnel to bypass the slower line through Hazel Dell. That is when the visionary put his plan for an industrial resort town into action by building that town around the new “shortcut” line.

     Chesapeake & Ohio (C&O) 614 is a steam locomotive built by the Lima Locomotive Works in June 1948 along with C&O locomotives 610-613. The engine was officially retired in 1955; however it was reactivated in 1956 along with several others.
In 1975, 614 was retired again and sent to the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad Museum in Baltimore, Maryland. Due to a roundhouse fire in 1979 that damaged a Reading 4-8-4 2101 owned by Ross Rowland, a trade was made for the ex-Reading 2101 (after the exterior was restored) for the 614.
     In 1980, the restored 614 made its maiden run pulling the Chessie Safety Express through 1981. After the successful system tour, 614 was kept in Hagerstown, Maryland until 1985. But not before making a highly publicized trip through our town in the early part of the 1980′s. These pictures were supplied to us by James Spielvogel who chased the train all over town to get these great pictures for us.
     According to Wikipedia, “the American Coal Enterprise was developing a modern steam locomotive to be used as an alternative to rising oil costs by burning coal, known as the ACE 3000. The 614 was modified for better performance, and fitted with testing equipment to measure the performance of the engine. For several weeks in January and February 1985, 614 (now 614T, symbolizing it as testing) hauled coal trains between Huntington and Hinton, West Virginia. The 614′s fuel consumption costs were actually lower than most diesel locomotive’s operating at that time. Unfortunately firebox problems and a booster failure later on severely hampered the test results in the end. After the test runs, it was later returned to Baltimore under steam. The project never moved farther than the testing stage.” The 614 was required to pull 26 cars at 79 mph on some sections, and maintain speed up several hills. Since the end of the project, 614 has been moved to storage on the Reading and Northern Railroad in Port Clinton, Pennsylvania.
If you remember the big steam engine rumbling through town and would like to share your memories, please leave a comment below or email us at info@ellwoodcitymemories.com

Originally Published Sep 15, 2010 

Standard Engineering began operations in Ellwood City in 1902 at the corner of Second Street and Park Avenue. A Subsidiary of the Standard Steel Car Company from Butler, PA the Ellwood works had previously been the Baker Forge-Hardware Company.
     Built 1894, the Baker Forge-Hardware Company was located east of Second Street and stretched from Franklin Avenue to the railroad tracks. The company that had been originally a partnership between J.H. Baker and H.W. Hartman manufactured wagon hardware until being replaced with the manufacturing of railroad steel car forgings. When Standard Steel Car Company took over, the name was changed to the Steel Car Forge Company until 1929 when the name was changed again to the Standard Steel Car Company, Steel Car Forge Division.

It was reported in a 1916 Pittsburgh Gazette that the Steel Car Forge Company was the largest plant of its kind on the North American continent. They manufactured rolling and tube mill machinery, pipe threading machines, sand rolls and high grade gray iron castings. The black and white picture was taken from the Peerless Lead Glass Company at the eastern end of Park Avenue while the color picture appears to have been taken from the former ground of the Ellwood Brick Company.

In the first fourteen years of business, the Steel Car Forge reportedly knew no bad times and continually employed six hundred men. This time even included a strike at the Butler facility of the Standard Steel Car Company where one man was fatally shot when police opened fire into the hostile protestors. On July 19, 1909, an estimated 500 Employees of Standard Wheel Company joined the Standard Steel Car Companies 2,500 Strikers in Butler and things got violent. As mentioned, police fired into the crowd killing one, wounding two and ten others were hurt. Even during all this, the Ellwood works continued to produce.

     Standard Engineering considered Ellwood City an ideal place for great manufacturing with an unlimited supply of working people and free from labor trouble. The town’s water and electricity were considered very cheap and it also had what they regarded as a first class fire protection. Ellwood also had the freight service of four great railroad systems with Pittsburgh rates and the additional advantages of no extra charges for transfer.

When times were difficult for other industries, it seemed to have no effect upon the Steel Car Forge Co. Its product, if nothing else had already made Ellwood City famous, would have attracted the eyes of the world to our community because of its being at the very top of the world’s industries. The Steel Car Forge was often referred to as a “mechanical blacksmith shop” operating on a tremendously larger scale. It performed blacksmith work but entirely by machinery. In the early part of the century, the Steel Car Forge Works produced forgings for freight cars and also a general line of forgings for all railroad and for special purposes. Standard typified, as perhaps no other industry could, the progress that had been made by the beginning of the twentieth century.
In May 1934 the Pullman Company ceased operations in Ellwood City and moved all the machinery worth keeping to the Butler facility of the Pullman-Standard Car Manufacturing Company and the property sat empty until 1939 when the property was purchased by a company you might have heard of, the National Tube Company.

    The first picture of the tube mill was believed to have been taken late summer/ early fall of 1916 from the area that was formerly Tunnel Field. For the younger generations, it is easy to forget how big the National Tube Company (a subsidiary of United States Steel Corporation) was.

    The second picture with a close-up of “the smoke stacks” was only a portion of the tube mill that ran from the railroad tracks by the Second Street overpass to the Ewing Park Bridge. The Ellwood City Works of the National Tube Company later expanded to 127 total acres with 23 acres under a roof. Employment reached its highest point during World War II when 4,000 people were employed.